Today I went to many places. One of them was to Nippombashi, to check out the Animate store there. While browsing through many different manga books and anime products, I also bought Weekly Shōnen Magazine (60th Anniversary Edition).
Buying a Weekly Shonen Magazine (60th Anniversary Edition)
The Weekly Shonen Magazine is a weekly shōnen manga anthology published in Japan by Kodansha. I am a manga newbie, but the more I stay in Japan, the more enthusiastic I get about Anime/Manga. Saying it out loud “I love Japanese comics art”—Well, I always loved comics art-style, but the Japanese style has its own unique signature that I really love.
I don’t read Japanese, but I thought I’ll take this ¥300 magazine is a souvenir and give it to my niece. The inside the black and white manga stories with a few color pages at the beginning, some of Japanese girls in a bikini.
Checking out many Japanese Manga Books
The Animate store has several floors. If you are looking for the adult material, this is a Melonbooks (comic, Dojin & good total shop), on the 4th floor. This is actually a separated store from the first floor. I first thought that it’s all one big store, but each one has its own cashiers.
I also liked the 5th floor, C-Labo I think it is called, where you can see other people play Card Collecting Games. This is the same place I learned to play Magic The Gathering.
Around the entrance, you can see the newly released Manga books.
The first floor is very big. It’s not as big as Animate in Tokyo, but it definitely has a huge selection of manga books and anime CDs. I guess many foreigners will prefer ordering the English-translated version of those books online. The English ones that I saw here are very expensive relative to Japanese books. By that I mean, around 300 Yen vs 1500 Yen, more or less. I was able to find cheaper English ones at Book Off, which cost me only 100 Yen second hand (like new).
I visited all the floors, slowly going through many of the products there, see if there is something I particularly like. Most of the time, I just get it to see what’s new and enjoy the beautiful anime art-style.
Here are some more anime goods you can find at Animate on different floors, including magazines, t-shirts, posters, toys and more.
Overall, I had a great time like always visiting Animate at Nippombashi. I highly recommend this store to any Manga/Anime fan. The English book selection is very limited, but if you are a fan, you had to check it out. I always get back there, several times a week, I just enjoy being surrounded by and browses through beautiful anime art.